Paul Gauguin: “In every country I have to go through a period of incubation; each time I have to learn to recognize the various species of plants and trees, of all nature, so varied and capricious, never willing to give away its secrets, to yield itself up.” I feel the same way … for me, the weather, the soil, the river needs to feel like second nature … that my life is in “tune” with my surroundings. Texas is a separate “country” … so different from California. We are going, each morning, to the State parks on the Rio Grande River to see the native plants, birds and butterflies. The names are great: Cenizo – Mexican olive tree – Huisache tree. We shall learn their names, learn their habits, soak in the ambiance of this desert valley located on a river, the Rio Grande River.

As I walk thru the campus a loud buzzing arises from the trees … it gets louder … louder. I look up … around … No one else notices the background noise so I ask a woman “Do you live here ?” She nods. “What is making this buzzing, scraping, sound ?” She smiles and says ; “It is the cicada – at this time of year – (early Sept) – they hatch, produce this sound, mate, and die.” I thank her, sit on a bench in the hot, humid air, and wonder – and then at the MFA orientation Josie de la Tejera states that her entire art work is based on the cicada. She shows us slides of the insect … it grows for 17 years in the ground before emerging. She compares it to a teenager who emerges from childhood.

The work refers to a poem by Matsuo Basho.
A cicada shell
it sang itself
utterly away